If Only He Knew
by Cssty
Summary: The Doctor reminisces about a friend that he forgot to a person willing to listen. But what would happen if he were to remember her and she wasn't there? Heavily relied on by the diner scene in Hell Bent, season 9 spoiler warning. I don't own Dr. Who
1. Chapter 1

**Hey! This is my first of many Dr. Who fanfictions! (I say many because I have many planned because my friend Eli and I have just spent long time just brainstorming headcanons) So props to Eli for the idea of this! I don't own Dr. Who, but there are parts of this that follows closely to the Season 9 finale, Hell Bent because it wouldn't make sense without it. I hope you like it!**

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There was a man that walked into the empty diner, an older man with a guitar and sunglasses. He looked worn from his travels or whatever he had been through. Whatever it was, it seemed like a lot. The diner may have been empty, but he wasn't alone.

There was also a girl, with brown hair and gentle brown eyes. She was full of life and walked up to the man to keep him company. It was like they had never met, but they have.

"How did you get here?" The man question her, to which she responded, "Magic."

After a pause she included "Or maybe I just went to an airport, got on a plane." And when she questioned him about the same thing, he responded exactly the same, "Magic". The man was fairly interesting, said he had been traveling from time to time.

Maybe he really was magic, because when the guitar was strummed there came noise. The girl looked to him, her gentle eyes turning sad. "Is that a sad song?"

"Nothing's sad till it's over." He responded, "Then everything is."

"What's it called?"

"I think that it's called... Clara."

There was a beat of silence. "Tell me about her." She suggested, leaning on the counter.

"No I really don't-"

"Tell me about her." The girl insisted, going back and grabbing some lemonade. "Please, I'm always up for a good story."

The man sighed, nodding his head. He then began his story, and it would've seemed strange to the girl if she hadn't heard it before. The man told how he went back to his hometown in space, and how a huge space boss was determined to kill him.

Even though she knew all about it, she found it in herself to ask, "Is it a story or did that really happen?"

"Every story ever told really happened." The man informed. "Stories..." He paused. "Are where memories go when they've gone."

He continued with his story, and she listened intently, adding little things like "That Clara person you must really like her." And "The thing that you took, what was it?"

He looked up, and told the girl, "In order to protect Clara, I needed to wipe some of her memories. Of me."

She became quiet and he got eyes of sympathy before the story continued to grow, and the more he continued the more she realized how much he really cared about this Clara. He finally got to the part of the story that was most painful for her to listen to, how he was going to get rid of his memories of her, or delete her memories of him. Either way, it would leave a hole in one of their hearts.

He let her know the things he knew about Clara, and the things he forgot. You could tell from the emotion on his face that losing this person so close to him was devastating, though he wouldn't say it.

The girl couldn't help it. "Are you looking for her? She can be anyone right? You don't know who you're looking for, you know. She could be me."

"There's one thing I know about her, just one thing. If I met her again, I would definitely know."

"I was here with her once." He continued, but then remembering it was another one of his lost companions. She would know he's lost many.

With that the girl turned back, and mentioned the TARDIS, and after a small discussion about that, the man got up and started playing again.

"You say, memories, they become stories when we forget them. Well, maybe some of them become songs." She mentioned, walking towards the door.

"That would be nice." The man said, focused on sadly strumming his guitar.

"Yeah, it would be, wouldn't it?" She responded, smiling at him for one last time before she slipped in the door.

Realizing he was alone again, the man stopped strumming and shook his head, looking at the door the girl left from. "Oh Clara... If only I could remember you." He muttered to himself, as the diner setting disappeared and he stood there, looking around at the empty place he was in. By then he noticed something, his blue box. The TARDIS. He walked to it slowly, with the mural of someone who's face he didn't know on it. Gently pushing it open and walking inside, there was a note on his chalkboard reading "Run you clever boy, and be a doctor". There was also his other coat. He didn't know what had drawn him to that coat, but he slipped it on knowing there was something significant related to it that he forgot.

Grabbing his new sonic screwdriver, he pulled the lever and started going on a new journey into space, but alone. Like the beginning, no companions just him and the TARDIS.


	2. Chapter 2

The girl from the diner was trying to keep herself together when she walked into the door, leaving behind the man. One thing kept going through her mind, "If only he knew, the fool." Shaking her head, she chuckled and looked up as the diner was being transported, due to being connected to the original TARDIS.

If only he knew who Clara Oswald was. If only he knew Clara Oswald was in front of him. If only he knew Clara Oswald was her.

"Still no pulse?" She turned to face the other person who asked her that, the person who brought the diner there in the first place with her, Ashildr.

"Time isn't healing, I'm still frozen." Clara responded, facing her and nodded. "Which means my death is a fixed event on the universe, depends on it happening."

"I'm sorry." Ashildr said back, after nodding in agreement.

"Why." Clara snapped back, with a smile on her face. "Why does everyone think that I'm so scared. We all face a raven in the end that is the deal." She paused for a second and then continued. "If I go back to Gallifrey they can put me back, right? Where they took me out?"

"Of course."

"... We should look over him."

"Look over him?"

"Yeah. You know, stop off on the way."

"To Gallifrey?" Ashildr questioned, cocking her head.

"Like I said, to Gallifrey." Clara responded, pulling the lever as the grin came back onto her face. "The long way around."

The TARDIS started up with light, as the two girls headed off. Going off where the wind took them. There was no way for the doctor to know that the two appeared in his timeline for many years, but they made sure to watch over him and keep him safe, because that's all Clara wanted him to do, to stay safe and keep doing what he does best. Being the doctor.

But after weeks and months, Clara and Ashildr decided it was time. They had been waiting long enough, and time still had not been healing, it was only getting worse.

And when they approached Gallifrey, they were accepted with open arms. Then Clara was faced with the question she was preparing for all this time in the TARDIS looking after the Doctor. "Are you ready to go back into your timeline?"

Clara didn't even have to hesitate. She closed her eyes and took a breath in. "Yes, I am."

When she opened her eyes, she was right back there, face to face with the Raven. This time her thought wasn't "be brave" In fact, her thought wasn't anything at all. But what she did do was take a glance at the doctor and smile, so she could take in the face who she could never forget.

He may have forgotten her, but he was in her mind forever.

Every single moment, from when he regenerated to now he was by her side. And although he wouldn't remember any of it, she remembered all. There was no way she would be able to forget. Then the Raven hit her. It was all over again for Clara Oswald.

But would he really not remember forever? What if she died again?

The thought wasn't spoken, but it could happen.

And it did.

From all the months of traveling alone in his TARDIS, little memories started tricking in. It just started when he was asleep but oh no, when he was awake to. They were very specific, and at first he was confused and afraid. Where were these dreams coming from, and who was this girl?

He kept rolling names through his head, but they only confused him more. Until one time, it came to him.

"Clara." The doctor mumbled under his breath, shooting up from the steps of the TARDIS. "Oh Clara, Clara!" He shouted, throwing his arms into the air. "The diner, the diner, it makes so much sense!" He said to himself, fiddling with the controls, positive that he would finally find the girl he had been searching for all this time. He remembered her. He remembers, and he didn't think he ever would.

So when the doctor found himself at the diner, he had this huge grin on his face. Flying open the TARDIS door, he marched up to the diner, swinging open the doors. "Clara Oswald!" He announced, grinning. "You impossible girl. I came back! I bet you thought I never would!"

When he was greeted with silence, he called again, "I remember! I remember everything. I could never forget you I was only kidding before!"

"She's gone, Doctor." Came a voice from the door that Clara exited so long ago. "She went back. She died."

"No. No she didn't. She..." The doctor started, pointing to the counter that was now empty and filled with dust. "She was just there. Ashildr she was just-"

"-Doctor please. She's gone."

"She is not gone!" The doctor argued, raising his voice a bit. "She wouldn't do that. She wouldn't go back and die, Clara Oswald wouldn't just-"

"But she did doctor. She did." Ashildr responded. "She did. And if you can't handle that, then you're just like most of the other weak people that I've seen in this world."

"...It was because of you, wasn't it." The doctor muttered under his breath looking to the floor.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"It was because of you, wasn't it." he repeated, raising his voice again. "Oh no making me have to delete one of the other from our minds wasn't enough for you, huh, she could've lived the rest of a life, Ashildr. But you probably talked her into going, hm? Going back and dying again."

"I didn't do anything doctor." Ashildr argued, stepping towards him. "She chose to go."

"No!" The doctor shouted, shoving Ashildr away. "No! Clara wouldn't go and leave when she could have lived! She could have lived! Had a huge life, a family! Or had more adventures!"

"She wouldn't have any adventures without you. Trust me when I say this she wouldn't go on an adventure without you. She wouldn't live a life without you. And why would she go with a person who didn't remember her? Doctor, that's not fair to her. Aren't you happier, remembering her now? Having memories, aren't they enough?" Ashildr asked gently, looking at the doctor with pity.

The doctor picked his hand up and moved it, only to slam it on the counter. "Leave." He muttered under his breath. "Ashildr, leave." He repeated before screaming, "Did I make myself clear yet? Leave! I never want to see you again! It's you're fault she left! I'm sick of seeing your face, go!"

After those words, she turned and walked to the very same door that Clara left at. "You just don't want to accept the truth doctor." She responded cruelly, before opening the door and slamming it.

Being alone once again in the empty diner, the doctor looked around, only to realize that his eyes were clouded up. It didn't take long for the tears to start falling, pounding down his cheeks. She was here. She could've said goodbye. He could've said farewell. But instead she just had to go again, and he just had to remember.

She was here. But now she was gone.

And the doctor was left alone with his tears, with no one to calm him and tell him it's okay. And most importantly there was no Clara.

He wanted her to be here with him. He needed her with him. But she can't because just as fast as he remembered her, she was gone. Slipped from his grasps once again.

"Clara..." The doctor muttered, repeating her name over and over again as his tears streamed down his face. "Did you have to go?"

He saw in his head, the way she smiled. The way she held herself. The time she actually fell in love with Danny Pink, and the pain on her face when she lost him. The doctor also remembered what it was like to have her arms wrapped around him in the hugs he always protested.

Funny. Now he longed for one of those hugs. To hold her once again. But he can't.

He was paralyzed by his shaking and his sobbing, thinking about Clara and her decision to leave. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair.

But through him being a wreck, he could hear her saying things. It was a bit reassuring, even if it was her voice from memories. Things like "I don't hate you." "Shut up and show me some planets." and her whispering "Let me be brave." before the Raven struck her. Remembering the way she asked him when he couldn't remember her, "You been traveling?" when she already knew the answer. Or when she was a mess, threatening to throw away the TARDIS key.

"You. Now, you listen to me. You're going to be alone now, and you're very bad at that. You're going to be furious and you're going to be sad, but listen to me. Don't let this change you. No, listen. Whatever happens next... wherever she is sending you, I know what you're capable of. You don't be a warrior. Promise me. Be a Doctor."

Be a Doctor. That's one of the last things Clara said to him. That rung in his head as he stood up, still shaking, his tears slowing as he repeated it to himself softly. "Be a Doctor." Wiping his face with his hands and shaking his head he looked up. "Well Clara Oswald... If you wanted me to be a Doctor I guess... I guess that's what I'll do."

Turning around to leave his breath still not steady he noticed something glimmering in the dull abandoned diner. Curiously walking behind the counter and grabbing the item, after he realized what it was he clenched it in his hand. It was her mother's ring. Something that was hers. Something that belonged to Clara.

Clenching it even tighter he closed his eyes and whispered, "Oh Clara Oswald... How I loved you." and he walked away, slipping the ring into his pocket.

The doctor walked out of the diner and into the TARDIS, broken but remembering, heading out alone once again without hope that he will ever see Clara Oswald ever again.

If only she knew that he could remember.


End file.
